Pentax K-x 12-Megapixel Digital SLR Camera Kit/1 - Blue

I got this camera two weeks ago (an early Christmas present for myself). Last week I took it to Disneyland for its first big test, and I'm happy to report that it passed with flying colors. The camera feels really good in my hand(s), solid, and ready. It powers up quickly so I didn't miss a shot. And the pictures were terrific in bright sunlight and in low light situations as well. And when the sun went down and the Christmas lights came on, I was able to get some nice shots, handheld. Image stabilization and auto-focus worked like a charm. This is my first experience with a DSLR so I can't make comparisons (but a friend's new Canon was having difficulty focusing in low light); I can only say that this little camera is great! And the price is hard to beat. And the color? Nothing else like it. If blue isn't your thing, try green, orange, pink, etc.

First know it uses AA batteries. You are never far from more. The 8x Energizers have lasted more than 800 pics so far.

Easy lens swapping from earlier K mounts gives you a great base.

Great for point and shoot or technical set your self work.

Way more camera for the money than the department store Canon or Nikon.

A 5 star all the way around. The second one I have gifted.

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I bought it from another retailer. Really love the blue, which makes the camera special in your hands! The features and performance are great.

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Don't worry the color would peel off, it look pretty firm and nature on the camera which makes the camera fashioned

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Canon PowerShot A85 4MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom

I have given the A85 4 stars although I would have given it 4.5 stars if possible and A80 5 stars. There are 2 basic reasons why I like A80 more than A85, but you may decide otherwise:

1)Bigger CCD Sensor 1/1.8" on A80 vs. 1/2.7" on A85 which means 5 million pixels compared to 4 million leading to better image quality.

2)Flip out LCD screen (1.5" on A80 vs 1.8" fixed LCD on A85)The flip out screen is very useful when taking certain shots. I typically used the flip out screen most when taking

-shots of crowds down the center and of tall buildings by holding the camera above my head,

-in tight spot situations on hikes/treks where I could not shift much by twisting the screen sideways,

-of children/smaller objects on the ground without having to kneel on a sidewalk etc.

And NOW the A80 is cheaper too at Officedepot.com. At Amazon it is selling for much higher than the price of A85 which alone proves its popularity.

What A85 offers over A80:

1) SCN modes (beach, fireworks etc.)which may not be useful for people who like using more mnual controls as they have many presets for ISO etc. which may not give the best shot. The A80 offered an extra customizable setting in place of the SCN modes which can be useful too.

2) A85 also offers 3 resolution settings for video including 640X480 (VGA max 30 sec)while in the A80 the highest setting is 320X240 (max. 3 mins). However, the 30 sec video seems a bit short to me. I usually use this feature to capture special moments of children when my video camera is not handy.

3) Print share button: The A85 has a print share button which enables direct printing of images /downloads for marked images. This feature is not very useful for most people especially if you have Windows XP which enables slection/rotation of images and direct download as soon as the USB cable is connected to your computer even without using any Canon software.

What all AXX series cameras offer which makes this series Canon's most successful consumer series so you won't go wrong buying any camera in the series:

--Complete Manual functions available shutter priority, Aperture priority, White balancing, Manual focusing etc.

--Photostitch For stitching together panoramic views. I have shot countless seascapes, 'bridge'scapes, landscapes etc using this function. It is really easy too!

-Tone settings (Tungsten, Sunlight, Cloudy etc.),

--Special effects (B/W, Sepia, Vivid, Nuetral etc.) I have used sepia a lot when taking potraits giving them an 'old world' feel. Vivid has been helpful in special situations like a red kite against a blue sky to bring out the colors.

--Free Canon software, which works well and allows you to edit images, stitch images, make fun photos, maintain an album, change camera settings, edit videos, upload images back to camera to transfer to another computer etc.

--Use AA batteries which are available anywhere in the world. A Sony Super Quick Charger (5hours) with 4 rechargeable NiMH batteries is available for under $23 on Amazon! Charge these batteries upto 1000 times. I keep the LCD on for all my shots and usually I get 270-360 shots from each charge from the A80 including the battery power used to download these images to my computer with the USB cable and playing back these images for friends! That is quite a feat by Canon.

--Macro mode Great for close ups of children or product shots

--Many other useful features in the latest models (including A80)like being able to edit the movies in the camera, being able to see multiple images on the LCD, auto rotation of images, ability to add voice notes to pictures, evaluative graphs on the LCD, and much much more. After thousands of shots I still keep discovering new features I haven't used or better ways to use existing features.

If you are considering the A95, it is a great camera and a upgraded version of A80, however at a hundred bucks less than the A95 (amazon price) the A80 (Officedepot price) is a great camera with almost the same features except a few differences.

-A95 offers 5 MP, and the extra MP may not be useful for you if you don't want to go over 8X10 prints

-a slightly larger flip out LCD screen which is great but it will also use up the battery faster

-SCN modes (see above)

-Print share button (see above)and

-Flexizone (you can set the focus in any one of 9 zones) which is a nice feature if you like being creative with your compositions.

Overall you have to decide whether you want to pay a hundred bucks more for these differences or any one feature may be the deal breaker for you.

In a nutshell, if you are thinking of buying the A85 consider the A80 too!

This is my first digital camera having used film cameras for a very long time and I must say that I have no buyer's remorse over my purchase of the Canon Powershot A85. I agonized over a month comparing this camera to many others like the Powershot A80 and the A95 but it finally came down to pricing and what I needed the camera to do, which made the A85 more than enough camera for me. I didn't need a 5 MP camera to start out with and so I figured this was a good starter. It's a solid camera that produces great pictures and videos. The camera is well balanced for someone like me who wants to experiment with camera settings and someone like my wife who wants a simple point and shoot. 2 sets of rechargeable Nimh batteries are a must. I've had a little bit of difficulty shooting pictures of people at night without getting a lot of red eye. Fortunately I think this is something that will require more practice to perfect. If not the software, ZoomBrowser EX, that comes with the camera totally corrects the red eye for me. It is an easy camera to use and navigate. Over the past month I've tried to take a variety of pictures ranging from portrait shots to landscapes and I have been very pleased with the pictures. Once again I highly recommend this camera for someone who is just starting out and wants a reasonably priced quality digital camera.

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Eh, I don't really agree with the review saying that the zoom is very breakable. Yes there are quite a few items that will come up if you do a search on google, but considering how many millions of cameras are out there, the percentages are pretty low. I have a Canon A-series digital camera from last year that I took everywhere with me. I just threw the thing in my pocket without a cover or anything, and it never gave me any problems. I recently took this new one out to sea on a boat where it was very windy and nothing happened to it. I also read a comment in a review that battery life is so-so. Well, you have to realize that batteries come in all flavors, from cheap alkalines to NiMH and lithiums. The kind of battery used by the review was not specified. I recommend using rechargeable NiMH batteries at 2100 mAH and up. That'll be way more than enough to fill up a 256 mb card. Well, with that said, I'm going to rate this product based on performace instead of bad luck, and in terms of what it can do, it is really very good, even compared to cameras in a higher class. Picture quality is very good and there are more manual controls than any other camera in this price range. This really is the most bang you can get for your buck. It gives great results and is easy even for the beginner to use. I really do like Canon products, even at the "budget" level the A400 blows away the competition, and you really do get more than you pay for. I'm not saying that I'll only buy Canon stuff, but you gotta admit that they are pretty good. Oh by the way, if you're looking for a sealed up camera, the Olympus Stylus 310/410 has waterproof seals, but is locked in fully automatic mode. If you don't like the way your pictures are coming out, too bad. Some of the 4 meg Kodaks offer pretty good competition, with a nice amount of manual features and 4x zoom, but the trade-off is that you get a noticeable decrease in picture quality compared to the Canons, especially with shots taken at night.

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The A75 and A85 are Excellent follow-ups of the A70, and offer some very nice improvements. The most noticeable is the larger LCD, scene modes for those who don't like to tinker with the settings, "C" dial position to save your custom settings, and the print/share button to make things easier. For those who don't know, scene modes are easy-to-access presets of a combination of manual adjustments, optimized for shooting in different situations such as when you are indoors, at the beach, taking shots of kids, shooting at night, or shooting fireworks, etc. The camera features full manual controls over shutter speed and aperture, manual focus, saturation, exposure compensation, custom white balance, ISO, metering, and a histogram in playback mode. I know most people think they won't ever use some of these, but when you have an important shot that just isn't coming out, you'll be really glad you have it (or wish you did). For those who don't know, control over shutter speed means you can use a fast shutter speed to capture fast action or you can use a slow shutter to avoid using a flash or for taking shots of night scenery.

The areas where the Canon A75, A85, and A95 really excel at are:

Being fairly small(small price tag too!) for a camera with this many features and having picture quality this good.

Creative shooting: this is a great camera for those who want to do creative shooting but can't afford to plop down $600+ for a Canon G6 or more for a Digital SLR. It's got all of the most important controls, and with your memory card, you can do all the creative shooting and experimenting you want virtually free compared to using film. It's even expandable with telephoto, wide angle, or close up conversion lenses and there's also the waterproof casing.

All Canon cameras also come with an excellent software package that lets you stitch panoramic photos, retouch photos or rescue those that came out wrong, add special effect, and view thumbnails of pictures so you don't have to open them up to see what the picture looks like (good for those who are using an older version of windows, I know there are still a lot of you out there). The best part is that it's free! It does more than Kodak's software(which is pretty decent), you have to pay $20 to get the better version of Olympus's software, and Sony's editing software is pretty much non-existent. Those who already have Photoshop won't be excited.

For those of you who are concerned that the camera doesn't come with rechargeable batteries, don't worry, it's really not a big deal. Good rechargeable AA's, type NiMH are super cheap at around $10-$15 for 4, compared to $50 for Lithium Ion battery packs, and at that price, everyone can afford a spare set, which is really important to have. I've seen people who bought much crappier cameras at the same price, just because they came with rechargeable batteries not a smart choice in my opinion.

Yes, there is the problem with purple fringing, but it's not a very common problem and most people either don't know what it is or don't even know think it's much of a problem when they see it. Some people think it looks cool. With full control over aperture, you have the ability to get rid of it or at least reduce it. Compared to the problems that other manufacturers have with their cameras, I'd take a bit of purple fringing over noise, soft/fuzzy images, and over-sharpening any day!

If you want 5 megapixels of resolution, a very useful rotating LCD screen, and Flexi-Zone (lets you choose an area that is off-center to focus on), then look at the A95.

Please note: my review of the A75 is the same as the A85 because they are pretty much the same camera with the 1 megapixel different. There are some differerences between my review of the A95 and this one.

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Absolutely amazing camera.

First a little backhistory. I owned Canon products for the most of my life. My first digital camera was an HP however.

After my HP broke about 2 years after purchase (hardware failure, nonspecific, 150 bucks to fix at HP) i went with this camera. The difference is amazing.

Canon products have always been a favorite choice of mine due to ease of use. Its settings dial makes it fast and simple to change from mode to mode for various uses.

Say for example your filming your son at the soccer field. you want a nice portrait of him with the field faded in the background. use the portrait mode. Then you can use the same camera to get a fast shutter shot of him playing on the field simply by turning the dial.

you can even shoot a 3 minute movie of him playing on the field using the same camera! All it takes is the turn of the dial.

In addition to the different settings modes, there are 'creative' modes that you can enjoy by changing the shutter speed and the amount of light the lens lets through (arpeture? value)

this can be used to create some amazing effects of sparkling and flowing streams and waterfalls, or of glowing fountains or fireworks... or even "Light trail" photos.

The creative zones are great when you've got plenty of time to play around, and the preset modes are top notch.

Its hard to take a bad picture with this camera.

The "auto" mode is so powerful that you can literally open the box and start taking photos immediately. After a quick read through the manual you'll know how to take photos like a pro, and with just a little bit of learning and experimenting you'll be taking some real artsy shots too ;)

The battery life is amazing, especially with the optional canon NIMH batteries. The batters that came with it are not rechargable, but i was able to shoot over 100 shots + film 5 or 6 highest resolution movies (30 seconds a shot) before the batteries were dead. My NIMH batteries fully charged have taken over 100 shots and are still hot.

Now, about memory. Flash memory is some of the least expensive and better quality memory for digital cameras. The fact that they've gone with flash memory cards here is ideal. It ships with a 32 meg memory card (retail of about ten dollars as of this writing) and getting 256 meg and up is generally under 50 dollars.

Finally we talk about printing features. The canon camera has easy printing and easy sharing with any canon printer with a camera dock. This is largely most Canon printers. You absolutely will love any canon printer you buy, i believe them to be the best printers you can purchase. Canon has entry level printers for well under 100 bucks, some under 50 bucks in some cases (as of this writing, the IP1500 sits on my desktop) and they're the best in their price range, across all price ranges.

I honestly think it would be difficult to make a mistake purchasing this camera.

My only suggestion is to consider the Canon a95 camera, which is 1 megapixel higher, and has a swivel LCD screen. I had no use for the swivel screen and the larger picture depth wasnt worth the extra cash at the time of my purchase, but its something to consider if you're reading this review.

Levana ClearVu Digital Video Baby Monitor with Color Changing Night Light (LV-TW301)

The Levana Clear-Vu digital baby monitor does exactly what it says it does, and it does it well. It sets up easily and transmits a clear picture in both light and dark. It's a cute little unit that is attractive and easy to use. The nightlight feature is pretty and soothing.

However... i feel it is lacking in a few features, and could use a few basic design adjustments.

First, the quietest sound level that it will adjust to is still VERY loud. I don't need to hear EVERY SINGLE breath that my baby takes, i just want to know when she's crying.

Second, the switch for turning the video on and off is very tricky to do at 2am in the dark. It would be far easier if it had a push button on the front of the unit than the slide click on the side. It's such a pain that i've taken to just sleeping with the unit tucked into my hand so that i don't have to fumble around in the dark to turn on the video.

Third, the switches on the camera are all on the bottom of the unit so that once you have it mounted in it's holder on the wall it's extreme;y difficult to change the settings.

Fourth, and probably THE most annoying is that the monitor unit has no stand other than the charging unit. It needs a belt clip and/or pop-out stand like the other Levana models have.

Additionally, I would like to purchase another charging base, but cannot find one anywhere, not on Amazon and not on the Levana website. You'd think they'd be more than willing to give you more things to spend your money on.

But maybe I'm nit-picking, because honestly, it's a very nice product that i will keep and continue to use. But if I had to pick a "perfect" monitor, this would not be it.

We bought this monitor and it worked well for about 6 weeks. It has a shorter battery life than the Summer Infant (which we had prior to this one) but we made it work by moving the base around the house with the monitor. Few things I noticed early on:

There is no "kickstand" to stand the monitor upright. You either have to have it on the base, or lay it down flat.

There are no "sound LED lights" like the Summer Infant monitor, so if your baby is crying, there is not way to tell with the volume lowered. You have to have it very loud to hear the crying. There are no lights at all on the monitor to detect sound like on other video monitors.

LASTLY AND MOST IMPORTANTLY:

During the night, about twice a week, the unit completely malfunctions and stops working. I've called about this and they have had me run tests such as trying different outlets, checking the battery life when it stops working, etc., and they still cannot tell me why this happens.

Basically, the monitor, in the middle of the night, just completely shuts off, even though it is on the base. The LED light on the monitor and the base are glowing green. If I remove the monitor from the base, the battery is fully charged, so it is not dying on the base (and why would it, if it is on the base and running from the outlet's power?!) If I take it off the base, move the switch to "off" and then back to "on" it goes back to working. My baby cries and I cannot hear him because the stupid monitor shuts off while I sleep.

This is happening more and more frequently, and I've called Levana. All they can do is have me ship the monitor to them for testing for 2-4 weeks, but what do I DO IN THE MEANTIME without a monitor?! DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND STAY AWAY FROM THIS PRODUCT!!

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As several others have stated, this monitor flat out does not work!! I thought I would try another brand since we had a Summer model for our first baby...wish I hadn't. It only worked for a few weeks. Now we've tried every trick in the book to get it to function properly but to no avail. The monitor will not turn on even when plugged in &, one time when we actually did get it to come on briefly, the screen froze up & there was no sound. Completely unreliable & very cheaply made. Unfortunately we purchased it before our baby was born so by the time we started using it & realized how horrible it is, we are beyond the return period with Amazon so will also be trying to deal with Levana directly now. After reading what other people have posted, I'm not looking forward to this experience. Don't throw your money down the drain on this product like I did!

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This monitor was on our registry and we're happy to get it until we used it. The video is great, nice features, night vision, clear picture, etc... but the AUDIO IS HORRIBLE.

The monitor (video and audio) uses a 2.4Ghz transmission. What does this mean? Any device using 2.4Ghz transmission could and most likely will interfere with each other causing static or bad reception. Here's the important part...most WiFi routers use a 2.4Ghz transmission. If you don't have WiFi chances are your neighbors do and their WiFi will interfere and give you static.

I did an online chat with Levana and they suggested I remove any devices that could operate on 2.4Ghz transmission. I don't think my neighbors would appreciate me asking them to disable their WiFi so I can use my baby monitor.

So what are we going to do? The video/audio monitor will now become a video only monitor and we'll need to buy a separate audio monitor, preferably at 900Mhz.

Hope this helped!

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It looked like a good monitor and I liked the feature list, but as soon as we turned it on we were greeted with a constant hiss of static that was unbearable. I don't know if it was interference from something or just a faulty unit. We don't have a house phone and I turned off the wireless router but the problem remained. There didn't appear to be any way to adjust which channels it used, and the product documentation didn't say that it automatically tried using different channels. Even though everything else worked great, we couldn't get the static to go away so we returned it.

V7 Mini Displayport (m) to HDMI (f) Adapter (CBL-MH1WHT-5N)

Amazon was the seller/fulfiller. This came in a sealed package with a hard protective sheath covering the Mini DisplayPort. The quality felt the same as an Apple-branded adaptor I own. I set this up with a MacBook Pro and an LG TV. The mirroring icon popped up in the header as soon as it was attached. Selecting Enable Mirroring was all it took for video to work. The System Preferences dialogue box for Displays even showed it was an LG TV connected.

Sound did not automatically work. And there was no option in Sound preferences to output to the TV. However, I used a 3mm cable in the headphone jack and sent the output to my surround sound system. Worked great.

At a price under $10 (and fulfilled by Amazon), this was well worth the money.

I have:

Model Name: MacBook

Model Identifier: MacBook5,2

Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo

Processor Speed: 2 GHz

Number Of Processors: 1

Total Number Of Cores: 2

L2 Cache: 3 MB

Memory: 2 GB

The V7 Mini Displayport did not fit the port on my Macbook. The staffperson at the Apple store told me that my version of a Mac does not have an adapter for HDMI if you also want sound. They have one for just video display, for which you need the adapter: Micro DVI.

Again, the only audio you will get from that will be from the computer speakers, not your TV.

He recommends a VGA cable with a mini-DVI to VGA adapter

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This product worked very well for me. also at lower price than stores so i would definitely recommend this product

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The v7 work's good with the MacBook pro that has a mini displayport adapter. The vision and audio works great on the television.

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Blackberry ACC-40486-301 Micro HDMI Data Cable - Retail Packaging - Black

This was worth every penny plus some. I really enjoy being able to hook it up to watch movies and even give presentations.

Excelent accesory for your Playbook, you can watch exact what you see on your tablet on your plasma with excelent definition. Picture, HD videos and much more. Recomendable!!!

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I'm sorry about the length......So I love it and would be 110% happy had I not received a used cable. the packaging had clearly been opened and the item used as the ports had signs of use obvious by the scuffs and light discoloration on one port. The way the cable was packed inside the worn packaging was not like any other item from RIM would typically be packed. I paid for a brand new cable and I feel I did not get what I paid for, instead I got someone else's unwanted and returned item. Shortly after receiving it, bummed when I should have been happy, I decided I was going to return the used cable and get exactly what I payed for, a new cable. I gave it more thought and considered that I waited a long time to get this cable and it worked fine. So I decided against returning and I figured this one time I could SETTLE and just deal with it despite me feeling like I was not receiving the best customer service. In conclusion it works but someone else had already used up some wear on it before I did and i won't ever get that back......

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JVC Everio GZ-HD6 3CCD 120GB Hard Disk Drive High Definition Camcorder with 10x Optical Image Stabi

Excellent image quality, good color and contrast, amazing resolution. Very easy to use and setup. I have owned Sony cameras almost exclusively and wondered how the joystick control would work over the touch screen it worked very well if fact I liked it better. My largest concern and the reason I returned this unit was because of the wind noise. No matter what the setting, the slightest breeze would create an awful muffling sound drowning out important sounds even kids screaming and having fun at the pool. However, to be fair, the indoor audio quality is right up there with best in my opinion.

If you want to edit videos created by this camera consider this -the iLink (IEEE 1394) firewire connection does work however you must record in the lower quality 1440 CBR (Constant Bitrate Mode) in order to get the video over the link and into popular capture software such as Adobe Premier, Sony Vegas and Apple's Final Cut Pro. I found this to be a little confusing and not well documented. Moreover, the camera will NOT stream video over this link only playback previous recording footage.

Batter life is remarkable and the included software works great. You can create DVDs and Video CDs right over the USB cable using the supplied software.

Also, I read a ton of reviews about the awful image quality when taking video in low light conditions. I have to disagree with these prior reviews. I found it to perform about even with the Sony HDV-A1U a professional HD camera.

Times have changed since I first hoisted fifty pounds of camera onto my shoulder and trudged around shooting. Technology has made it possible for anyone to compete with the professional in terms of quality.

As a professional who has worked in the industry for a while, I've invested a lot of money into equipment over the years. Recently, I took a look at my stock of standard definition prosumer cameras and compared them to the prosumer HD rigs out there. I found that I just couldn't stomach dropping another $3K to $10K on a rig that would likely be obsolete in a month. So when I needed an HD solution for a small project, I decided to buy a consumer-grade camera and "make do."

I had no idea at the time that I'd be able to find a camera that can not only shoot full frame HD but do so in a sleek, compact package that has almost all of the features I would look for in a professional rig.

Don't get me wrong ... there are features missing here, or buried in menus when they should be a button on the camera's body. But overall, I have to say that I am very impressed with this inexpensive HD solution. The 120GB hard drive means I can shoot 10 hours of full-frame HD, and the three CCDs mean I get the full range of detail, color, and data that I would expect. Two options for transfer--USB 2.0 and Firewire--are handy. And the simple fact that it has both a mic input and headphone outputs already puts it in a league above other consumer cameras.

This camera is an indie's dream. Cheap, outstanding quality, and plenty of room to shoot without worrying about tapes or other expendable media. And with 120GB onboard, you don't even have to worry about transferring! I could shoot an epic trilogy on this thing.

I highly recommend this camera to anyone who wants HD at an affordable price.

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I own this camera for 12 months now. I agree to the positive reviews about the video quality and light handling. However when it comes to PC connectivity this camera simply don't! The only way to get your videos on your PC is through the supported software. You can't stream live video and you can't use common software such as Movie Maker or Windows Media Encoder to capture live video or to immediately edit the recorded video (on the HD). The computer seems to recognize the camera as an AVC compliant device but nothing more than that. And when it comes to using the supported software is sucks! The software is very cumbersome to use, it uses a quite rare video format (some MAC type of TOD files) and the video editor software has very limited options for even the basic edits. If you need to edit your videos on your PC be prepare to for a tedious job.

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I bought this for my wife and it worked amazing! I liked it very much. Takes good photos too. Battery life is decent. The only thing I do not like is the movie file type it creates.

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This was a very good investment. The price was very good and the quality of the video is excellent. The HD video is supurb. I have had it for a few years now and finally getting around to write the review.

My only complaint is the video extension I wish were more of a standard format. I believe it writes to a .TOD which needs to be converted.

Canon EOS Rebel T3i 18 MP CMOS Digital SLR Camera and DIGIC 4 Imaging with EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 I

I got the camera in a big nice package with all the items & camera properly packed.

Camera is working perfectly ok. All the parts sent as part of the deal is nice & new as promised by Big Value.

I strongly this retailer to everyone else.

Everything arrived five days early. The camera, SD card, everything works great except a few items were missing from my kit that I ordered. I'm missing

1Lens/LCD Cleaning Kit

1Mini Table Size Tripod

1Pack of LCD Screen Protectors.

I managed to grab this deal at a price of $812. You can't complain when the camera is $850.00 and you get that at a cheaper price and get all this other stuff for free basically.

Another reason I downgraded it one star was because of the level of cheapness that some of the items were. The lens aren't entirely that great but do the job until you get canon ones, I got an olympus bag (not a canon bag), The SD card reader fell apart on me during the unboxing.

I'll upload an unboxing of this kit soon so you can see that this is a legit deal in case you're thinking about buying it.

Update:/ 4/21/12: I received my missing parts days after I complained. The package was in a small case and was a simple mistake. I give them back another star for their quick customer service.

Ryan

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This product was given as a gift, when I opened the box everthing was packed in great condition, the camera took great pictures and the battery lasted several hours on continual shooting

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I can't say enough about the camera as far as the quality of the images produced and the functions you get. It is a great entry level DSLR packed with amazing features at a very reasonable price. In fact the price is so close to a point a shoot digital that it is almost a no brainer for the average Joe/Jane.

The body is plastic compared to professional grade Canon cameras which makes it feel lighter than say the 60D. This is a plus if you like light weight cameras, but does leave you feeling cheated when holding the 60D in another hand. Still the flip out screen, HD video and easy to use interface makes this an amazing deal.

As for the bundle, the only thing I really value is the memory card, filters, and the extra battery. Everything else is very poor quality and the tripod is a hazard. If you can get just the Battery/Memory bundle do that and save some money for higher quality supportive accessories. I recommend Magic Lantern installed for those wanting to maximize the functionality of this camera.

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My bundle arrived 4 days after I ordered it. Everything came neatly packed in the box and works great. The extra battery came fully charged, so I could use it right away. The camera's image quality is amazing. I would recommend to everyone, especially if you can find this bundle for a great price like I did.

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eForCity 25ft Ultra High Speed HDMI Cable, Version 1.3, 1080p, 25 ft

Order this 25FT HDMI cable and worked fine from my desktop to my HDTV. I didn't have any issues what so ever. I hear that many people tend to have issue with their cable (cables that are abnormally long, 25FT, 50FT, etc); you need to be sure not to bend the cable at a sharp angle. If it needs to be bent, bend it so that it curves. HDMI cables have very intricate wiring and these can be broken, therefore you must take care when setting up your home theater system or wiring through the wall.

Bottom line, cable works and I'm happy.

This was a cheap and easy way to get my macbook to my big 52" screen. It was dirt cheap (FU Monster Cable), works well and coils up nicely when not in use.

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Hard to review a cable: if it works, you don't think about it. If it doesn't work, you hate it. I don't hate this cable, but I wouldn't say it is a love affair... OTOH, I do love my TV and if this thing helps my TV, it is like a friend of my TV and me... I mean, it brings us together into a more perfect pixel world. And who could ask for more than that? Remember: "An Ultra High Speed HDMI Cable is a TV's best friend" (which is more than you can say about a dog).

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I needed about 20+ feet from my PC to HDTV and this worked pretty good.

I can't see any loss in picture / sound quality.

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Nothing wrong with this product at all, the picture is nice and crisp.

At first, there was a lot of flickering, but I found that for connecting a computer to a TV with an HDMI cable, the computer should have a 1080i output, not 1080p. After switching these settings, it was fine.

Panasonic BL-C210A Internet Security Camera

Bought this camera through one of Amazon's Gold Box Deals for $130. For the price, it's a great camera. This is my second Panasonic network camera. A few years ago I bought their BL-C1A model Panasonic Network Camera and Pet Cam (BLC1A). The BL-C210A is a much nicer camera. The picture image is several times better, especially when motion is involved. You have the option of pan and tilt to look around. You can disable the indicator lights on the camera that lets you know the camera is on. You can also disable or override the privacy mode button on top of the camera. You can configure the camera to email you a picture when it detects motion in your house. Now how's that for peace of mind while you're away? And my favorite is that the camera is powered through the network cable which eliminates the need for a power outlet near the camera. The camera has a threaded mounting hole in the back that can be used to mount the camera to a standard tripod or an optional wall mount. The cube design is nice because it allows you to just set the camera on a shelf or table. The camera is light, so a tug on the network cable can bring it crashing down if it's not secured.

There are limitations with the camera. If you want to view an entire room, you'll need to mount the camera in a corner. It can only pan 41 degrees to the left or right, 10 degrees up and 32 degrees down. The camera is powered through the network cable, but it doesn't support the industry standard PoE. Luckily it comes with its own power injector. You'll need to purchase two network cables to use this camera. One cable connects the camera to the power injector and the other connects the power injector to your router/switch. The cable between the camera and power injector must be shorter than 98 feet. The box says you can only view still images from a cell phone. The website says you can't listen to audio with a cell phone. I haven't tried either. The software works pretty good, although I have found a few minor bugs in it. You have the option of viewing multiple cameras on one screen, but the max resolution for multiple cameras is only 320x240 and not the 640x480 max camera resolution. You don't need a computer onsite to use the camera, but you'll need one to do the initial setup.

Panasonic has nicer cameras than this model, but the prices also get outrageous. $185 (current Amazon price) is not bad for one camera. But after you buy one, you'll want more so you can monitor the rest of the house. That's when $185 per camera starts adding up. If the price drops again, I'll definitely buy another.

Note: The zoom function is not obvious. There are buttons on the screen to do everything but zoom. I discovered you can right-click on the top half of the video to zoom in and right-click on the lower half to zoom out. You can also use the wheel on your mouse to zoom in and out.

Update (March 9, 2010): I did a little research on the camera model (BL-C111A) that the BL-C210A replaced. This camera has a larger CMOS sensor but the same resolution. The old model can pan 50 degrees to the left or right while this model can only pan 41 degrees. The old model can tilt down 40 degrees while this model can only tilt down 32 degrees. The old model had a 10x digital zoom while this model only has a 3x digital zoom. The digital zoom is not very good. If you have a need to zoom in on objects, you'll want a camera with an optical zoom. Some new features added are SSL data encryption for secure viewing over the Internet, power through the network cable, H.264 video compression, and the ability to operate the camera with some models of Panasonic flat screen TV's.

I bought another camera from Amazon to monitor the back door and kitchen area. It comes with mounting holes on the back of the camera so you can slide it down on a couple of screw heads. It frustrates me that you can't mount it flat on a wall and pan 90 degrees to the left and right. I ended up purchasing mounting brackets VideoSecu Ceiling Mount Bracket for CCTV CCD Box Body Pro Camera 2-6 inch Adjustable MCB1w 1A2 so I can mount the cameras in a corner. Again, I really like the ability to power this camera through the network cable. I have the cameras and my network equipment all plugged into the same UPS. This way I can still monitor my house in the event of a power failure. If you're looking for a camera to monitor the baby's room, this is not it. You can't see much with only a night light on in the room. You're better off with a dedicated baby camera. We've had good luck with a baby camera made by Astak Astak 2.4 GHz Pan & Tilt Baby Camera with 2.5" LCD Color Handheld Monitor with Night Vision. It can pan and tilt to see the whole room, can see very well in the dark even with no lights on, and comes with a handheld color monitor. The monitor eats batteries so we just turn it on when we hear something or want to check up on the kids. It also comes with an AC adaptor for continuous monitoring. Another reason why a baby camera works better for monitoring babies than this camera is that you don't have to fire up your computer in the middle of the night to see if your child is awake. A word of warning, many baby camera's operate on the same frequencies as your wireless network. You might need to play around with the channels on both the baby camera and your wireless network until they don't interfere with each other.

A year or so ago, we installed an Ademco burglar alarm which we found we could not hook up to a monitoring service because we had dropped our landline. There are services that will monitor your alarm system through the cell phone network but they are expensive. So I decided to make a project out of this. I would find a way to monitor the alarm system with zero net monthly cash outlays. I spent idle hours wondering how I might cobble together some homemade piece of equipment that can capture the alarm signal off the Ademco and fire a programmable event on one of our computers through a USB port or something like that. Tricky stuff. Iffy.

Then I discovered the fact that this ip camera (as well as many others) have e-mailing functionality. After a little research I bought a couple and they are now in service. I connected the bell circuit on my Ademco, through a relay switch, to one of the two open alarm circuits on the Panasonic and now whenever the Ademco sends an alarm, we receive an e-mail with an alarm message plus, as a bonus, a photo of what the camera is seeing at the time. When we get the e-mail, we can go online either with a computer or our cell phone and see what is going on in the house. If the situation merits, we can then call the police or we can ask the neighbor to peek over. This is intelligent alarm monitoring as opposed to the automated kind you get when your alarm system sends a signal to the monitoring station every time the system is tripped for whatever reason (I read that almost all reports sent to the police by these systems are false and are placed on low priority). I am going to document this system and send it to my insurance agent asking for a premium discount in line with the standard discount you get with automated monitoring. We have achieved our goal of a no-cost alarm notification system.

Two very good features of this unit are that you do not have to have a running computer to make it work and it receives its power over the ethernet cable. As long as your run is less than 98 feet, you can snake cable through your walls to your heart's content without worrying about how you will power the camera.

Since this camera has, in addition to its ability to take a signal from your burglar alarm, its own internal motion-heat-sound detectors, you could also use it as a sort of burglar alarm all by itself. But it does not have the capability to act as a perimeter alarm as would be the case if you have an alarm system with door and/or window sensors. And it does not turn on sirens to 1.) wake you up, 2.) scare the intruders away or 3.) if they are not scared away, heighten the level of insanity that is already going on in their minds.

Like the others, I find that the camera does not perform well in low light. But I have several lamps in our home that are hooked up to X-10 switches. These X-10s are programmed through the burglar alarm to turn on when the alarm goes off. I have not tested them with the camera yet but I am hoping that they will provide enough light to let us see what is going on in the event of an alarm.

There is one glaring vulnerability in all of this: your camera gives you notification and visual access through the internet; your house connects to the internet through a wire; burglars know how to snip a wire with a wire cutters and the more experienced burglars are going to do this before they attempt to break in. I circumvented this problem by changing my ISP. My new ISP connects the internet to my house wirelessly and that fixes that. If you do not have the wireless option, however, this issue needs to be addressed. Many alarm systems now can be fitted with an auxiliary backup device that calls you and/or the police through the cell phone network if your wire is cut. They cost extra both for the equipment and the ongoing use of the cell phone network.

We got a lot of value for our money here. It proved to be an elegant solution to our problem and added many more features to boot. I love gadgets and my heart sings whenever I see it up in the corner of my living room ceiling with its lights blinking down on me. What other people might think is 'beyond the scope of this review'.

ON PANASONIC SUPPORT: I'm not going to lower the rating on this camera because I think it is a fine product. But I will say that Panasonic support falls far short of the mark. In trying to get the camera viewable over the internet, I talked to 4 different representatives each of whom offered a different solution all of which were wrong. I wrote them a letter a week ago with no reply so far. So I did what I should have initially done which is to learn a little networking, specifically port forwarding. After my research and armed with some actual knowledge, I set up the cameras properly and they are now humming along. I can credit the reviewer who praised Panasonic support. However, that was not my experience. All these people had to do was to ask the right questions and then tell me what to do to configure the system properly. It took me, an amateur, a couple of hours to figure it out on my own and yet all four of these professionals failed to come up with the correct solution. And yes, I am fully aware that this is partly a result of a lack of committment on the part of management and not entirely the fault of the individual on the other end of the phone. 1-14-2011 UPDATE: Yesterday, I came across a puzzling issue having to do with sending sensor messages from the camera to our Panasonic Viera TV. Since I already know how good they are at fielding support requests over the telephone and through the postal service, I thought it might be interesting to send them an e-mail message via their website. The model of the camera was stated in the e-mail by way of the e-mail setup fields and I gave the model of the TV in the body of the e-mail. Later that day, I received this reply which I quote in full: 'Thank you for your inquiry. What is the model # to your cameras? If you have any additonal questions or concerns, please contact our technical support hotline at . Thank you for choosing Panasonic.' Additional questions indeed.

SETUP NOTE: If your network sits behind two in-line routers (one connected directly to the internet through the phone or cable TV wires, the 'outside' router; the other sitting between the outside router and the LAN: the 'inside' router) and you are having a hard time of it, identify both the public and private IP address of the inside router. Do a little googling to get yourself squared away on what the public and private IP addresses of a router are. Then, when you are setting up port forwarding on the outside router, you need to forward requests to the public not the private IP address of the inside router. Then use the private IP address of the inside router as the Default Gateway in your camera settings. There are other pitfalls but this particular one was my mine.

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I would change the rating to 2 and would not recommend purchasing if you need LOW Light like a nursery. I absolutely do not recommend this or the 230a for a nursery!

Review updated on 2-27-2010. I will start by saying this was a very difficult to set-up camera on a Mac using Snow Leopard with VM Fusion and Parallels. I was not able to get it to work on VM Fusion and Windows 7 and eventually switched to Parallels with Windows XP I finally got it to work. I also have Trendnet TV-IP422W which was simple to configure.

Pro's

1. Comparing the picture in bright light using Parallels, IE and H.264 the picture is AMAZING. I will use the word 'Shocking' to describe how clear the picture is. Compared to Trendnet it is laughable how clearer the Panasonic picture is.

2. Web interface is great and is not limited for Mac users like Trendnet

3. The P/T is Very quick and much quieter compared to Trendnet

4. Unit size is very nice and the POE is well thought out.

Con

1. Night 'vision' is completely worthless. In the nursery with only a nightlight the TV-IP422W switches to a b&w view and we can see basic outlines, blanket vs child is a bit of a challenge. However, turn on the night vision IR's and you can. No switch to the panasonic setting next to the Trendnet, NOTHING. When I say nothing I mean, you can't see anything just a black room. No joke!

2. The range of the P/T is very limited and I haven't figured out how to zoom.

3. It appears H.264 compression improvements only work on IE and Windows. You do not see a benefit with H.264 on FireFox or Mac browsers.

4. I found it very difficult to setup on a Mac and feel free to leave comments if you are having trouble and I will see if I can help walk you through what I did

I received a 4 pack of Synology surveillance License and it works great. You can P/T and detection appears to work. I'm using the latest beta firmware on a Synology DS 409.

Final

Bright and I mean bright light the picture is amazing. Dusk the picture is not as good as the Trendnet and in very low light there is NO picture! If you have the need for Low Light pass on this camera! I also bought a 230a wireless and I used the same approach and was easy to set up and will put details in comment response. I'm returning the 230a as it doesn't work in low light of a nursery.

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Has been playing with this network camera for 3 days and here's my opinions:

1. Setup is easy. As long as your router support DHCP, it's just a matter of popping the setup CD and click on 'Camera discovery'.

2. Good built-in software. I have another Panasonic BL-C111A network camera and both of them can show up in the same page.

3. Need two ethernet cables separately: One goes to your switch and one goes to the camera. They both connect to a proprietary PoE injector.

4. Tons of features: Motion trigger, Time trigger, Upload images to ftp, send images by email, remote access, etc.

Let's talk about the image quality, as it's probably the thing most people are interested in learning. In short, if you need a camera for mission critical monitoring (business location, identify a thief, etc), this is probably not your camera. The sensor of this camera is only 1/4" CMOS, which means it will be performing badly in low light situations. If you are looking for a camera for your business, then get a camera that have sensor size of at least 1/3", those cameras cost at least $400 or more. However, for basic monitoring, or use it as a gadget, then I think it should be fine.

Comparing my older BL-C111A and this camera, I came to the conclusion they perform almost identical, i.e. suck in lowlight, decent in bright light conditions. For the BL-C210A though, the overall image is sharper but it also gives a lot of 'mosquitoes' noise. My older BL-C111A has a softer image, but with a lot less noise. So it really depends on your preference, I find the 'mosquitoes' noise annoying, even though the image is sharper.

Another thing is, they advertise this camera as 640x480 30fps capable. This is another one of those advertising gimmicks. The camera image looks the best when they are 320x240. In 640x480 mode, they just extrapolate or enlarge it from 320x240, hence, the noise is even more pronounced in 640x480 mode. You will not see any more details in 640x480 mode than you will in 320x240. But again, this is a $130 (or $180) camera, so this is to be expected. If you need more detail in your images, then consider a 1/3" sensor camera.

In conclusion, I think (just my IMHO) the image quality of this camera is no better or worse than generic Chinese made IP camera you can get on ebay (they all use 1/4" CMOS sensor). However, Panasonic wins out in terms of support and the software features/quality. I would give this camera a 3.5 star for the image quality, and a 4 star for the value.

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The MPEG-4 and H.264 are very clear (as clear as 640x480 can be). If you need more than 2 people to be able to watch it, you'll have to not use H.264. The MJPEG is quite a bandwidth hog on LAN, so if you expect to monitor this remotely you would best try to use the more efficient H.264 or at least MPEG-4.

If it bothers you to have to switch resolution every time you open it, then set it the way you want it (640x480, etc), then create a favorite and/or desktop icon with the big long address box contents and it will open that way every time.

The low light isn't spectacular but it's better than I get with my Logitech Pro 9000 webcam. It's better to see some things really grainy than to see nothing.

The zoom is client-side, you can see when others move the camera but not when others use the mouse wheel to zoom in, it's not an optical zoom..

The audio works great and there is a configuration for 3 microphone sensitivity levels. Programming the presets sent me to the manual but it's not hard once you see how to do it (the Program button above the presets, when logged in as admin).

I have not, and will not, install any included software, so my review is limited to what you can do just accessing the camera via a web browser.